


A Handful of Pennies

by cenotaphy



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Benny putting up with Dean's pining, Dean in Purgatory, Dean looking for Cas, Gen, M/M, One Shot, POV Dean Winchester, Pining, Purgatory, Technically pre-Destiel I suppose, could be interpreted as totally platonic pining, prayers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-08 13:22:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8846668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cenotaphy/pseuds/cenotaphy
Summary: "I prayed to you, Cas. Every night."Dean wasn't lying. Purgatory was a miserable damp hellhole in the bottom of the universe, and there were a lot of other things he didn't think about down there, mostly because he was too busy trying to stay alive—but he wasn't lying. Not about that. He prayed every damn night.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Instead of getting actual work done I decided to write this quick piece about what Dean's prayers might have actually been. Please let me know what you think!

After that first, frantic night, during which he tried damn near everything, it's a full week before Dean can bring himself to pray again. Like maybe if he doesn't acknowledge Cas's absence, the angel will just pop back with a flutter of unseen wings. But he spends the eighth day of his Purgatory stint running from a pack of werewolves, and by nightfall he's so exhausted that it slips out before he can stop himself.

"Cas, I—"

He clamps his mouth shut around the words, angry at himself, and at Cas too for good measure.

***

But the next evening, sitting with his back to a huge, implacable tree, he gives in and whispers into the empty dusk. "Cas...could really use your help here, man. Where are you?"

There's no response, and Dean thumps his head into the bark. He's tired and cold and afraid and the air in Purgatory is so damn _heavy_.

***

He gets into the habit of praying every night, even though he doesn't expect an answer. Mostly just a few sentences. Sometimes he just mutters, "Cas, you got your ears on?" and then ends it there because, really, what is there to say.

***

After a particularly rough day he's pissed as hell and snaps to the surrounding forest, "I don't know what the fuck is up with you, man, but you better be fucking running for your life out there, okay? Because believe it or not I actually need you here, and—" He bites it off and rolls over onto his side. _Fuck him_.

***

The next night he feels bad, and so he clasps his hands together and mutters, "Sorry about last night, buddy, I'm sure you've got your hands full, wherever you are. Uh—hope you're okay out there."

***

The eighteenth day is a bloody one, and when he finally staggers to the streambed and his knees fold under him and the improvised blade drops out of his loosening grip, it's all he can do to keep from retching. He's surprised when his hands find each other—sliding wetly, palm-to-palm, interlaced fingers slick and red with blood that isn't his.

"Cas," he manages, and has to squeeze his eyes shut and just breathe for a moment. "Cas, I...this place...I'm scared of it. I'm scared of _me_." He chokes out a laugh. "I just killed like a dozen frigging gorilla-wolves and I didn't even blink. I...fuck, I need you here, man, I need you to look at me and tell me if I'm any different or if—or if I'm still me."

He wants, maybe more than he's ever wanted anything, to turn around and see Cas standing there behind him. He wants to hear Cas say his name. He makes himself wait, kneeling there in the sand, because as long as he doesn't look around, it could still happen, Cas could be there.

He looks around.

Cas isn't there.

***

He gets in the habit of praying every night, before he closes his eyes. He loses track of how many days he's been here. One night he tells a long, meandering story about a time Dad was out and Sammy was sick and Dean stayed up to watch him, frantic with worry, but in the morning the fever broke and everything was okay, after all. One night he lists every rock song he can think of, just to be a dick in case Cas _is_ listening. One night he just mutters, "I miss you, alright?" and then hunches down under his flimsy shelter and crosses his arms tightly and doesn't say anything else.

***

His prayers get longer as the weeks and months go by. He rambles about his day, about what he's killed, about what's tried to kill him. He talks about what he misses from the real world. Some days he doesn't have the energy for long prayers, though, or the will for it—some days he just mutters a quick good night, or a weary "fuck you, you dick" to the sky.

***

Purgatory is lonely. He misses Sam. He misses Bobby. He misses Cas.

"Wish you were here," he says aloud, muffling the words with his sleeve, because it's not a good idea to make noise in this place. "S'good to have someone at your back, here. And I could use the company. This place kinda sucks the joy out of everything."

He rolls onto his side, then onto his back. "Sorry for all the prayers. I'm sure you have a good reason you're not here. Or—well, this is Purgatory we're talking about, so it's probably a _bad_ reason. You're probably in trouble, huh?"

His mind unreels a hundred possibilities for what kind of crap Cas could be in. "Don't do anything stupid, Cas."

He tosses and turns and he can't sleep that night.

***

He's fucking fed up, is what he is. "What is this, huh? What the fuck are you doing, Cas? Is this some weird heroic crap? Are you punishing me? Did you go off your rocker again? What's going on? Where the fuck are you?"

***

The wendigo ambushes him while he's asleep. Scents him out and drags him from his flimsy camouflaged shelter like he's a piece of meat, which he is.

"Cas!" he screams into the night, trying to fight it off, trying to keep it from slashing his throat. There are teeth in his arm, claws in his face. "Cas, _please_!" But there's no answer, no rescue, just the wind roaring loudly in the trees, and the wendigo lunges down and—it lets him go, suddenly. Drops him, backs off, sniffing the air like it's just scented fire, and then, as Dean heaves himself onto his elbows, it's gone, bounding into the undergrowth and vanishing.

"Cas?" Dean scrambles to his feet, bleeding from everywhere, it feels like. "Cas, is that you?" He whirls in a desperate circle. " _Was that you_?"

There's no response, but the air suddenly feels colder, and the hair on his arms stands up, and he thinks—maybe it _was_ Cas, but if it's something else—or if, say, Cas _did_ show, for just a second, but something _else_ is hunting _Cas_ , is hot on his heels—and either way, if something can scare a _wendigo_ —

Dean runs.

***

"I don't know if that was you," he whispers into the darkness the next night, still wincing from his wounds. A tiny fire guttering in a hollow in the ground next to him, just in case another fucking wendigo decides to get any ideas. "But if it was...thank you."

***

Maybe it wasn't Cas with the wendigo after all, because Dean cries out for help again a few days later, when a vampire has him pinned and is trying to rip out his carotid, but there's no response. Nothing. Zero. The silence sparks cold fury in him; Dean knees the vamp in the groin, gets the upper hand of the fight, and takes its head off with one sweep.

"Thanks for the help," he spits defiantly at the sky.

***

One night it rains, oceans coming down from the sky in freezing torrents. Dean hunkers down and everything's wet and cold and muddy and miserable and he thinks that maybe if he doesn't pray for a few days Cas will get concerned and actually come check on him. But a few hours later his resolve cracks. "You out there, Cas?" he calls into the rain, for once not worried about anything overhearing him through the downpour. "Hope you're getting wet too, asshole."

***

"I wish I even knew if you were out there, man. Sometimes I worry that—maybe you're—"

***

"Cas, all this killing—I think it's—I don't know, sometimes it feels too easy, too simple. Like I'm—made for it. Am I? You've seen my fucking soul, I _know_ you know, can you—just—fly over here and tell me, please, is this—am I—this place is so _shitty_ , so why does it also feel so fucking _right_?"

***

"Killed a shtriga today. Coulda used your help. God, I hate shtrigas. There was this one time, one almost got Sammy, when we were kids. My fault. I didn't watch him, and Dad, he—well. Guess you know a little something about orders from on high. Absent dads and all. It was my job, you know? My whole life, I just had one job. And I keep screwing it up—I screw everything up—I screwed _you_ up—and I just—I—fuck, you're probably not even listening. Fuck you."

***

"I miss you. Yeah, so there. I said it. You're good to have around, okay? There's not a lot of people I'd want to have my back in a fight, but you—what I said before, I meant it. I'd rather have you."

***

"Hell, I don't even know if you can hear prayers in Purgatory. Maybe there's no point."

***

"You son of a bitch, I'm not giving up on you, alright? I don't care if you're hurt, I don't care if you're captured, I don't care if you're just fucking ignoring me. I'm gonna find you."

***

After meeting Benny, he keeps his prayers even quieter, not wanting the vampire to hear. Benny probably hears anyway, but never comments, just raises his eyebrows when Dean brings up Cas, which is rarely, and stands in sturdy, tolerant silence while Dean interrogates this or that monster on Cas's whereabouts. Whatever—Dean'll take it.

"Fuck, I miss pie," he mutters one night. "I'm gonna make you try every kind of pie, man. I don't care if you can't taste. You're gonna humor me, because you're gonna fucking _owe_ me after all this shit."

On another night: "Cas, I think...I there might be a way out. Of Purgatory. I think we might be able to go home. So just hang in there, wherever you are. We're going to find you, okay?"

On another night: "Benny's a good guy, Cas. Dunno why I trust him, I met him in friggin' Purgatory after all, but I do." He chews his lip, then quirks it tiredly and adds, "Still wish you were here."

***

They've been on Cas's trail for weeks, and Dean thinks they're getting close. He can feel it.

"Hope you're steering clear of Leviathan, Cas. We haven't run into any. Benny says they're probably all chasing after you. He's, uh, he's not happy we're chasing after you too. But I've given it to him straight, and—" Dean shifts, a tree root digging into his back. "—and I'm gonna give it to _you_ straight, too. I'm not leaving this shithole without you. So if you're hiding out there, waiting for me to give up...it's not gonna happen. So—get your ass down here, pronto. G'night."

***

"Cas, if you're even listening...I know there's a lot of shit under the bridge. You pulled a lot of crap—fuck, what you did to _Sam_ —but I did stuff I'm not proud of, too. And I'm sorry for that. I wasn't there for you. But—God, I _want_ to be, okay? Because even after all that crap you're still family—I still trust you with my life, Cas, I do—so if you're thinking I don't want you around, or that I don't trust you...I do. You're family. You're the best friend I ever had. I want you back. Please. Just—let us find you, okay?"

***

They're close, they're _so close_ , and yet it's all near misses and false hopes and there's no angel to be found.

"I know you're alive, man," Dean whispers after yet another fruitless lead. "I know you're out there."

***

He guts monster after monster like it's nothing, and Benny doesn't blink an eye, and why would he? The more lethal Dean is, the better chance they both have of surviving. Brutality is _good_ , here. Viciousness is an asset. Dean kills all day and at night he pretends he doesn't still feel the handle of the blade beneath his fingers, throats and skin and viscera splitting around the knife edge.

"Fuck, Cas," he prays. "I—I just—fuck, I need you, I—"

***

He wakes up screaming one night, from a dream where Alastair has him flayed open on the rack, unspooling him bit by bloody bit—wakes up screaming for Cas, _Cas where are you Cas please_ —and then there's Benny's hand over his mouth, Benny's strong arm holding him still, Benny's urgent Southern lilt in his ear, for long seconds until Dean remembers where he is and how crucial silence is to survival, until he shuts the fuck up even though his heart keeps hammering like a drum in his chest.

He doesn't know if that was a prayer or not.

***

"Goddammit, angel, I don't care if I lose myself, if I lose everything that makes me _me_ in this place, I am _going to find you_."

The next day, they do.

***

After they find Cas, Dean obviously doesn't pray anymore. Except for once, when he wakes just as the sky is starting to get light, and sees Cas standing at the edge of the clearing.

Dean doesn't move, doesn't raise his head. He can hear Benny somewhere behind him, whittling away at the piece of wood he's taken to carrying around.

Cas is standing with his head bowed, his hands over his face. He isn't making any noise, but Dean can see his shoulders shaking.

" _Cas_ ," Dean mouths into the dewy grass. Soundlessly, just the shape of the words. He slides his arm out, inch by inch, until it's outstretched on the ground, his hand palm-up, fingers reaching for Cas. " _C'mere_."

This time, Cas does.


End file.
